Preparing For Graduation

Swarthmore network accounts for the graduating class are deleted around June 30th every year (one month from commencement).

What do I need to do prior to June 30th?

Back up files stored on Swarthmore servers:

Transfer or save all files you may want to keep from Google Drive (apps.swarthmore.edu) to another location.

Moodle accounts will be deleted. All posts, discussion board posts and attachments you added to Moodle will be permanently deleted from Moodle courses and organizations. If you wish to save any materials on Moodle please copy them to a personal storage device or cloud location.

Student files on the video editing workstations in Beardsley will be deleted. Please save a copy to a personal storage device or DVD.

Saving files from Google Drive

If you have documents that need to remain with a department or student group after your leave, copy or move them to your departmental or organization folder in Google Drive. These files will be available to your colleagues even after your Swarthmore account is deleted.

If you are migrating from Swarthmore to a personal Google account, transferring your Google Docs is easy. Just select all the documents you want to migrate, go to the Share menu, and grant your personal Google account Edit access to the files.

Next, log into your personal Google account. The files you just shared should appear under "Shared with Me". Select all the documents, right-click (or control-click)on them and choose Make A Copy. This will copy the files permanently to your other Google account.

(Alternate Method) Select all the documents you want to transfer, go to the More Actions drop down, and click on Download. This will compress all the documents into a zip file and download it to your hard drive. Afterward, you can go to your external Google account and hit the New > Folder Upload button in the top left corner, and re-upload all the documents you just downloaded.

MySwarthmore:

Your access to your MySwarthmore account using your student identification number will not expire. However, you should update your security question and answer so that you can return to MySwarthmore and set up a new PIN at any time in the future.

Migrating your Email:

Obtain another email account. If you do not have another email address already, you can obtain a free Gmail account.

In addition, we suggest setting up a permanent Swarthmore Alumni alias account which provides an easy way to distribute your email address as your future addresses change. For more information, visit the Alumni website.

Notify people about your new email address before your Swarthmore email account is disabled. To make the transition easier, you have a few options in Gmail. You can set up an auto-reply (vacation responder) that includes information about your new email address. You can also set up mail forwarding to your new email account until the account is disabled.

How do I set up an Automatic Reply (Away) Message?
Pull down the gear icon [Settings] to Settings. Scroll down in the General section. Under "Vacation responder" there is a check box for "Vacation responder on". When you check the box you are presented with a text box to compose your message as well as a first day to start sending the auto reply message. Click Save Changes at the bottom of screen to confirm your changes.

How do I set up automatic email forwarding?
Pull down the gear icon [Settings] to Settings. Scroll down in the General section. Under "Forwarding and POP/IMAP" there is a check box to "Forward a copy of incoming mail to". Check the box and enter the address you want to forward mail to. We recommend keeping the default of "Keep swarthmore.edu's mails copy in the Inbox". A confirmation email will be sent to your forwarding email address. You need to accept the forwarding from the confirmation email before it will begin.

Archiving your Gmail Inbox

There are two ways to back up your existing Swarthmore email. You can download it to local mailboxes on your computer using a mail client (we recommend Thunderbird, but any local client will work), or you can import your Inbox into an personal Gmail account using Mail Fetcher. Mail Fetcher only imports your Inbox label. If you want more than your Inbox, like Sent mail, you will need to move the contents of your other labels into your Inbox).

To set up Thunderbird and archive your mail to your personal computer:

Label incoming messages - Check the box if you’d like to easily see which emails in your inbox came from this account. Recommended.

​Archive incoming messages - Leave unchecked. Only check if you don’t want to mix the imported messages from the other account with your inbox.

Click Add Account. You can skip the "send mail as swarthmore.edu" step because your account will be going away shortly.

If you get an error message while getting set up, click the Show error details link to find out more about what’s not working.

Gmail will check your other account for new emails periodically. It may take a few days to import all of your Swarthmore mail. You can see when the other account was last checked from the "Accounts and Import" tab.

To export contacts from your Swarthmore Gmail

At the top left, click Mail > Contacts.

Click More > Export...

Choose whether to export all contacts or only one group.

Select the format in which you'd like to export your contacts' information. Note that some of these formats can lose some contact information.

To transfer contacts between Google Accounts, use the Google CSV format. This is the recommended way to back up your Google Contacts.

If you are experiencing difficulty accessing information on this site due to a disability, or if you have questions or concerns regarding the accessibility of content on this site, please contact accessibility@swarthmore.edu for assistance.